A Curious Affinity With Rats
by flourishes
Summary: Poor Pitiable Peter Pettigrew - the musings of Wormtail.


A Curious Affinity With Rats

By flourishes

_"Denial ain't just a river in __Egypt__."_

_- mark twain_

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_"If you define cowardice as running away at the first sign of danger, screaming and tripping and begging for mercy, then yes, Mister Brave Man, I guess I am a coward." -- Jack Handey _

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I've always thirsted for more than I have; yet I have never had the backbone or capability to achieve what I want. 

I rely on others for that, and it has been my downfall. Well, nearly. I'm not dead. Yet. I'm of the mindset that hell on earth is preferable to eternal damnation.

After all, I've created my own hell on earth. 

I don't have the luxury of custom designing Satan's lair. That is, after all, where I'm sure to end up. My puny, spineless, worthless, simpering self will make quite a nice addition to Lucifer's little flock.

I've learned that wallowing in self-pity is quite a nice way to pass the time. It keeps my mind off of other things, such as dwelling on what might have been.

Free will is such a nasty thing. I've decided to blame my problems on that philosophy instead of on myself. After all, if I hadn't been given free will none of this would have happened. I wouldn't have been responsible for what my actions have caused. 

I prefer the blank, blissful state of _Imperio_ – where my thinking is done for me and the responsibility for my actions lies not with myself. 

But back to thinking and dwelling. I have all the time in the world now. My master has other, more capable servants to carry out his tasks since his rebirth. Why trust anything to the foolish, bumbling wizard who gave his right hand for his lord?

I didn't have any choice, really. I hate that word. 'Choice'. 'Choices'. Dumbledore was right, with what he said to all of us when we were still in school. When my master was first rising. 

_"It is not your family, nor your pedigree that really matter. It is choices." _

Look at me, for instance. I'm a bloody Gryffindor. One of Dumbledore's treasured little Gryffindors. Look at where I ended up.

In my ambition for power, my yearning for greatness, I made the wrong choices.

I take that back. I did make one good choice in my life. That was to make myself seem pitiable enough that James Potter would take me under his wing.

Not _seem_ pitiable enough – I just was. That's right, Poor Pitiable Peter Pettigrew – chubby, bumbling, foolish, dim – actually any word with a negative connotation could be used to describe me. 

I've often thought, though, that Poor Pitiable Peter Pettigrew would make a good tongue twister. One of those little ditties that children recite when jumping ropes, perhaps. 

It's ironic, truly. How I was regarded as somewhat of a hero. Laughable, actually. Poor Pitiable Peter Pettigrew, tried to confront that murderer, Sirius Black, who betrayed the Potters and killed all those Muggles. 

Who would have thought that Wormtail could muster that much power – powerful magic indeed – to blow apart a street? I never would have believed it myself, had it not happened. 

Order of Merlin, First Class.

How convenient that their little ruse worked out so well. Everyone thought that Sirius was guilty of betraying his best friends and killing so many people – myself included, at the time?

It's funny how a few chosen words can damn a man.

_"Lily and James, Sirius, how could you?"_

It amazes me how absolutely ruthless I can be when threatened. 

James, Sirius, Remus – they were really the only people to ever show me any kindness. They made Poor Pitiable Peter Pettigrew one of their own. Moony, Wormtail, Padfoot, and Prongs. 

Look where it got them.

You'd think, after spending so much time with three boys – then men- who were made with such absolute steel, that some of it would have rubbed off on me. 

No such luck there. I am still as weak and spineless as ever.

Worse, even. Oh yes, much worse. I tried so hard – with that little bit of courage, of strength – that had slowly imbued itself in me by the years of total, absolute friendship and trust – to resist. But my master was so powerful then. Resistance was futile.

My own worthless nature succumbed to the power of the Dark Lord so easily – he knew all about me. My weaknesses. One of which was power. 

He was so nice to me. He showed me everything he could do, everything he had done. My master showed me glory. Glory that could be mine. 

He didn't even have to show me what he could do to me if I refused. 

I agreed to betray my best friends of my own free will.

There's that nasty word again. I was threatened, surely, but not very much. If he had so pleased, it would have been so easy to put me under the Imperius Curse. I wouldn't have been able to fight it off, and the same information could have been obtained. 

No, my master enjoys toying with his victim's emotions. 

He had them doubting each other, guessing as to who could be the spy. No one ever guessed that Poor Pitiable Peter Pettigrew would have the guts – or intelligence – to pass information undetected for more than a year. 

Oh yes, my Lord is the puppetmaster and James Potter unwittingly proved a very useful marionette. As many have discovered, decent people are so easy to manipulate.

And James Potter was nothing if not decent. 

My master said how he thoroughly enjoyed the look in James Potter's eyes as he realized that one of the few people he'd ever trusted in his life had in fact virtually guaranteed the deaths of himself and his family. 

But little Harry Potter didn't die. The helpless, happy go lucky infant whom I'd bounced upon my knee destroyed any semblance of the life I thought I had made for myself as a Death Eater. 

After all, my master was supposed to have honored me for hand delivering the Potters. 

~ * ~ * ~

I didn't want to go to Azkaban.

That's why I did what I did. 

Self preservation above all. 

James and Lily murdered not by my hand but by my actions.

Harry left an orphan.

Sirius – Padfoot – put in Azkaban.

Twelve Muggles, dead.

But I was alive. And that was all that mattered. 

Sirius was a fool to underestimate the power of my desperation. All of them, fools. They doubted Remus. Remus – who would have died for them because of what they did for him. Prejudices can be hard to overcome, it seems. Even if you spend years trying. 

It was Sirius and James who ensured that I would be able to live. 

They were the ones that came up with the idea to become Animagi. 

Again, it was Sirius's – and James wholeheartedly went along with it - idea to switch Secret Keepers. 

I'm indebted to them, actually. For both of those things. To James, again, for being so easily persuaded. And for the fact that he sired a son that is possessed of the very same nobility complex that James wore throughout his brief life like a cloak.

Good old Prongs.

I really had nothing but affection for he and Lily.

It's ever such a pity, what I had to do to them. 

I really can't blame Sirius and Remus for trying to kill me. 

I deserved it.

~*~*~

Sirius's voice echoes through my thoughts with frequent regularity. That's the bad thing about wallowing in self-pity; it has a tendency to bring about bad memories. 

_"If you made a better rat than a human, its not much to boast about, Peter…"_

I really can't believe that such intelligent people as James, Sirius and Remus could have so easily brushed off the fact that my Animagus form was a rat.

After all, the form that a wizard takes as an animagus is supposed to represent their innermost values – or, rather, the influences of the animalistic side to the person's nature. 

Of course, there were a few raised eyebrows at first. 

And then, there was laughter.

"You have to admit, Peter. With no insult intended to sully your self-image or whatnot, you do have small beady eyes, a slightly pointed nose, large ears – fits, don't you think? Imagine the possibilities – you can go anywhere in the castle!" 

_"But a rat?"_

_"Sirius walks about slobbering in human form. Why should his animagus form be any different?"_

_"Thanks, James. I appreciate your unmitigated support for the affliction that causes me to salivate uncontrollably at the thought of Snape's comeuppance, which will, I assure you, be helped along by a few sitings of a large, black, shaggy dog that also resembles a Grim. Me. This is going to be barrels of fun."_

Years of research into the inner workings of Animagi brushed off by a simple "you look like a rat". The thickness, at times, that Prongs and Padfoot displayed sometimes masked the real brilliance that lurked inside their minds.

James didn't realize how appropriate my Animagus form was to my true self until my Master appeared on their doorstep in Godric's Hollow. 

Sirius chanced upon that happy realization when he was digging through the ruins of their house with his bare hands, trying to reach the cold dead bodies of James and Lily, after watching Hagrid fly off on his motorbike with his bleeding godson securely tucked under one of his massive arms.

It was confirmed later.

Remus mourned me as a hero. How very wrong he was. How very, very wrong.

*~*~*

I realize now that I will never be anything more than a cowardly specimen – _Rattus__ Rattus, _of the family _Muridae_. 

Rats spread disease and destroy property.

I deal in different currency.

I spread anger and repulsion and destroy lives.

It doesn't pay very well, but it's cost enough for the miserable price of my existence.

Rats are simple creatures. Opportunistic, cunning. Their survival instincts are quite sound. Some I've met are good at the gossip. Most rats aren't cowardly.

I am. 

~*~*~

Percy and Ron Weasley are good boys.

Percy, he found me, took me in. Good chap, got his heart in the right place but his methods are all wrong. He was such a stickler for rules and propriety – such a mama's boy. I know how to recognize them. I was one myself. It was such a great surprise to learn from one of my Master's spies at the Ministry that good ole Percy had cut the apron strings and denounced his family. Anyways, Percy took right good care of Scabbers. 

I knew that as long as I was with the Weasleys, I probably wouldn't be found out. Not by Dumbledore, or Remus. Or the Death Eaters who thought I was a double crosser because Voldemort met his downfall on my information. 

Ron was a rather talkative lad. Told me everything – from daily news to his deepest, darkest adolescent secrets and fears.

It seems that Weasleys have no trouble spilling their innermost secrets to instruments of the Dark Lord.

My master, he feeds on weaknesses. 

Some of Ron's might be very helpful one day.

My intimate knowledge of the Weasleys is at times the only thing that keeps me alive.

For my master is troubled by the life debt I owe to Harry Potter.

Harry, Harry. I was so close to him for nearly three years. I know a lot about him, too. His habits. His way of thinking. What candies he likes. What color his socks are. His reading material.

I would keep myself amused when Ron didn't take me to classes.

I know, for instance, what kind of magazines line the bottom of Seamus Finnigan's trunk. 

Lavendar Brown keeps a diary. She thinks she's the next Cassandra. 

Little Dennis Creevey – his favored toothpaste is Muggle Crest for Kids – Blue's Clues. The tube has some kind of a picture of a dog and a crazy Muggle named Steve smiling like he's just used some billywigs.

Hermione Granger – that Muggleborn is one sharp tack. She sleeps with a copy of _Hogwarts, A History_. She uses it to prop up her pillow. 

Oh yes, those were informative years.

I guess I spread destruction, too.

That information will no doubt be used one day.

My master is right when he says I have a curious affinity with rats. 

I am one. That is all I will ever be. 

There is nothing I can do to change that, even if I wanted to.

The sad thing is, I don't.

**FIN**

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_The weak have one weapon: the errors of those who think they are strong.   
-- George Bidault_

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A/N – This is, for now, a one shot piece. It was written before book five came out but I did revise it just a smidgen after ripping through the book in like five hours.  I'm now on my second read. This story was the result of writer's block with my two other parallel fics, (Outside Looking In and Filmstrips, go read them if you're bored or whatnot) It was written mostly in-between classes – and, I'm ashamed to say, during. Anyways, I was scared to death this would fall out of my backpack in the hallways, and someone would find it and examine me for mental health issues. And in attempting to send this to my betas, I accidentally sent it to the wrong place – or so we thought – so there were a few days when we thought I actually would be committed. I mean, wouldn't you be scared if it randomly ended up in your mailbox? Luckily my email server was just being exceptionally slow that day. The fic got a bit darker than I intended it too, but then again, we're talking about a twisted individual here. I haven't come across many Peter fics, so I decided that I'd write one, just to get my mind off of the plot hole I'd written myself into with my other fics. Please let me know how I did. Thank you for reading, and Please Review!

PS – many thanks to betas Eleclyn Starmaker and TMJ. Randomosity, rocks, you know that? 


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